Building New Amenities
“Local Voters Deserve Details, Not Short Sentences or Vague Goals”
Adding & Improving Recreational Assets:
Issue: In the past few years, cities around Laguna Hills have all built and updated recreational facilities. Aliso Viejo opened The Ranch Community Center and is using county funding to update its public library, Mission Viejo brought a golf course and is expanding its Oso Park and Trail, and Laguna Niguel is building a new library and town center with the help of county funding.
Neel’s Goals: Buildout 3 New Recreational Assets Without Negative Impacts to the City’s General Fund
1. Veeh Reservoir “Lake” Lookout and Partial Lakeside Trail:
Using Quimby Park Fees from anticipated new housing developments in North Laguna Hills, install a small lake lookout roughly similar to Irvine’s South Lake Gazebo (in the Woodbridge Community) along with a partial sidewalk connecting the nearby shopping center and proposed housing to the lakeside lookout. Upgrading an existing reservoir to a lake-side amenity will bring something entirely new to city residents at lower costs.
- Note: Per Laguna Hills City Staff documents from the 1990s, North Laguna Hills is the most “park poor” area of the city1.
2. Greenhouse & Botanical Garden at the City’s Last Planned Park Space
- According to the City’s Master Parks Plan2, the last remaining park space yet to be built out is located at Aliso Hills Road and Alicia Parkway. Creating a small greenhouse with botanical garden will bring another entirely new amenity and rentable space to city residents with the added possibility of future trail connections to the LH Sign on the Hill and Ralphs Shopping Center.
3. New Public Library & Children’s Fossil Museum
- Our current one room library (technology annex) cannot accommodate more than a few groups of people at a time. According to the County Librarian, there are no plans to renovate the library either.
- My goal if elected, is to relocate the Laguna Hills library to the existing OCTA Transportation Center off Paseo De Valencia near the hospital. The larger library space can be built using the same County Library funding Aliso Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Brea, and Irvine have all received recently augmented with other county-level funding, statewide grants, and some of the Covid-relief funding Laguna Hills has received.
- My vision and goal for Laguna Hills is a library large enough to serve as a community center where families can learn together, children can play, teenagers can study and work on group projects, and older residents can participate in community events and connect with others.
- The old library space at the Community Center would then be converted into a small children’s fossils museum celebrating the rich natural history of this area. Fun Fact: Our city has fossils sitting in storage waiting to be displayed to the public someday (hopefully soon).
Footnotes:
- Laguna Hills Master Plan of Parks and Recreation, last updated Spring 1993 (not digitalized)
- Laguna Hills General Plan: https://www.ci.laguna-hills.ca.us/DocumentCenter/View/133/Laguna-Hills-General-Plan (Pages LU25 and LU26)